D-backs 4, Royals 10: A Bad Diaz Gonna Come…

Monday recaps return with a vengeance…

Record: 51-50. Pace: 82-80. Change on 2023: -4.

It has been a while since the last time I got to recap a win for the Diamondbacks on Monday. It was so long ago [Chorus: “How long was it?”], that it came on a walk-off home-run by Pavin Smith. That was June 3, when they beat the Giants 4-2 at Chase. It’s not quite as bad a stat as that sounds, because the vagaries of the schedule mean there haven’t been very many Monday games for me to cover. Indeed, that victory was the only such game for the D-backs in June. But July saw a 5-4 loss to the Braves on the 11th, and tonight’s defeat in Kansas City runs the D-backs’ record – and mine – on Mondays this season to an ugly 2-8 mark.

I guess if there’s a positive, it’s that losing to an American League team is less detrimental in the standings than doing so to a National League outfit. Especially if it had been one like the Royals, with wild-card aspirations similar to the D-backs. The early, blowout loss nature of this one also meant the B-bullpen got an outing, with the A-arms getting another night off. So they should therefore be ready if needed for the remainder of the series. The team will also need to make a roster move to make room for the expected return of Jordan Montgomery off the injured list tomorrow, and I would not be surprised if the winner of a ticket to Reno was Humberto Castellanos, who threw 40 pitches in mop-up work here.

Yilber Diaz might not want to be signing any long-term leases in Phoenix either, as the wheels completely fell off his wagon tonight. The first two starts for Diaz had been very good on the face of it, allowing two earned runs over twelve innings of work. But there were plenty of reasons, at the risk of stating the bleedin’ obvious, to suggest that the 15.0 ERA was not sustainable. The first would be the .206 BABIP enjoyed by Yilber in his outings to date. And there was also the high number of balls in play, with just seven strikeouts for Diaz over 12 IP. A 5.3 K/9 rate is a real problem these days: at the start of play today, none of the 72 qualified starters this year are below six.

Over on SI, Alex d’Agostino should be asked about lottery numbers, having posted an article earlier today, headlined “Yilber Diaz Needs to Find Strikeouts, Avoid Base Traffic vs Royals”. As I noted on Twitter, Yilber did not, and the results were ugly. To be frank, we probably learned tonight WHY Diaz was not heralded as a prospect. He was ranked only 16th on the team’s list by MLB Pipeline – and that doesn’t include anyone in the recent draft. Tonight in Kansas City, he allowed as many hits as he retired batters (nine of each), leading to seven earned runs. He walked one and struck out none, now giving him seven strikeouts in 64 batters faced. He got just three swinging strikes in 71 pitches.

It began well enough, Diaz stranding a one-out triple in the first, then getting the first two in the second. However, a walk then came around to score on a pair of singles. No big though, especially as the Answerbacks showed up. Doubles by Kevin Newman and Alek Thomas tied things right back up, and Ketel Marte’s 20th home-run of the season (above) gave Arizona a 3-1 lead, before an out was recorded in the third. All we needed was for Diaz to give us a shutdown inning to solidify the lead. Sadly, exactly the same feat was then performed by the Royals, scoring three runs before an out, to regain the advantage. They then tacked four more on in the fourth, for an 8-3 lead.

To be fair, three of those came after Diaz had left the mound, Miguel ‘Gas-can’ Castro coming an allowing a three-run homer on his first pitch. He allowed another homer to the first batter he faced in the fifth as well. His ERA for the year sits at 5.40, and those who questioned the decision to let his $5 million option vest last year, are probably saying, “I told you so” about this point. There was not much to discuss the rest of the way, except for Torey Lovullo getting himself tossed from the game. That began in the bottom of the sixth, when Bobby Witt Jr. (a single short of the cycle) was hit by Castellanos. I doubt there was any intent, just our mop-up guying being our mop-up guy.

But Kansas City clearly didn’t see it that way, and Gabriel Moreno found himself getting drilled with two outs in the seventh. Warnings were issues to both teams, and that pulled a very upset Lovullo from the dugout, as he ended up being ejected by home-plate umpire Jordan Baker (above). I look forward to the JomBoy analysis. I hope his bleeper has its batteries fully charged… Arizona did get a fourth run in the eighth inning, on a Eugenio Suarez sacrifice fly, as Castellanos allowed one run over three innings, in what seems likely to be his final outing for now. Marte and Christian Walker each had two hits while Alek Thomas reached base twice, on a single and a walk. Oh, and Witt never did get his cycle. 🙂

Considering our WP for this was down below five percent by the middle of the fifth, I’m quite impressed we managed to reach eighty comments – the Witt situation certainly propelled most of the late inning discussion. Hey, it did mean I was able to get a quick start on the recap, so there’s that. Comment of the night for Veeloh, who repeated a comment he had made earlier in sarcasm font…

Same two teams tomorrow, with a 5:10 pm first pitch Arizona time, probably with Jordan Montgomery taking the mound. I hope for better starting pitching, but will make no more specific prediction than “We’ll see.”